The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) today called on the Filipino people, especially the victims of the supertyphoon Yolanda and other calamities last year, to expose and wage mass protests against the antipeople programs and big business projects of the Aquino regime misrepresented as “rehabilitation”. The CPP issued this statement amid public outcries over the reported overpricing and use of substandard materials for bunkhouses being built by the Aquino government.

The Aquino government has hired private contractors to build at least 222 bunkhouses, the design and specifications of which have been criticized by architects and planners as subhuman and below international standards. Each bunkhouse, costing nearly P1 million each, is to be divided into 12 units of 8 meters square each, described as big enough only for two large tables.

The CPP pointed out that the reported overpricing of the construction of bunkhouses in Leyte is not the first of such cases under the Aquino regime. Early last year, residents of Compostela Valley exposed the overpriced bunkhouses constructed by the Aquino government for the victims of typhoon Pablo (international name: Bopha).

“Aquino’s substandard, inhuman and overpriced bunkhouses in Leyte are a grave insult to the victims of the supertyphoon Yolanda,” said the CPP.

“Tens of thousands of people continue to live in tents yet are prevented from rebuilding their houses where they used to stand as the Aquino government has duplicitously classified these areas as ‘no-build’ zones,” pointed out the CPP. On orders of Aquino, people are prohibited from constructing their homes within 40 meters from the coasts of Samar and Leyte province, purportedly to restore mangroves and marine life.

“This is a half-witted policy as people have long been living by the coasts where mangroves are healthy,” said the CPP. “In fact, the poor fisherfolk have been serving as the first-line protectors of the mangrove areas, as they are the ones who know full well that healthy mangrove areas make better fishing grounds.”

“Tens of thousands of small fisherfolk families and poor toiling people have been displaced from their homes and places of livelihood by Aquino’s no-build policy, and, they are bound to suffer even more with the subpar and inhuman conditions of the bunkhouses they will be cramped into,” said the CPP.

“The Aquino regime is taking full advantage of the massive destruction caused by the recent supertyphoon and other storms to attract and justify the allocation of large amounts of funds, and funnel these into the profit-hungry big private big business companies, especially those close to the ruling clique,” added the CPP.

“Local big capitalists and their foreign funders are drooling over the investment heaven being opened by the Aquino regime in the supertyphoon-devastated areas,” said the CPP.

“Aquino is making a big show of so-called rehabilitation, but has yet to put into place any measure that addresses squarely the urgent problems of the people for immediate livelihood,” said the CPP. “Among others, the people of Samar, Leyte, Panay, Negros, Bohol, and other areas devastated by the supertyphoons demand that the Aquino regime absorb the debts that poor peasants owe to big loan sharks.”

“The clamor for genuine land reform is being amplified by the broad masses of peasants,” added the CPP. “The peasantry and other toiling masses in the devastated areas are exerting all-out effort to campaign and struggle for land reform to bring down land rent and usurious debt interests, raise production, and get a fair price for their produce.”

“The revolutionary forces are working hand-in-hand with the people to organize work cooperatives and build communal farms in order for them to collectively confront the mammoth tasks of rebuilding their lives,” said the CPP.